


Borderlands 2, or, How to Murder Your Way Across a Planet for Fun and Profit with a Side of Revenge

by Twilit



Category: Borderlands
Genre: "Graphic Depictions Of Violence", Blood, Robophilia, brain matter too, look it's Pandora, so much blood, some entrails, that's cute, what do you want from me
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-05
Updated: 2014-05-05
Packaged: 2017-12-28 10:56:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/991216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twilit/pseuds/Twilit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Handsome Jack has gathered together a group of heavily armed, intrepid psychopaIMEAN Vault Hunters for extermination via railway!</p><p>...seriously, who thought this was a good idea?</p><p>(the story of Borderlands 2, told through various (cracked) lenses)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Right, some things to get out of the way here. Gaige and Krieg will be joining the cast, but at a later date. I know officially they were retconned into the train, but for the purposes of this fic, they meet the main four later in what I hope will be pleasingly rational, characterful and hilarious manners.

Four heavily armed figures stood in the compartment of a Hyperion armoured transport train that was moving at inadvisably high speeds. They regarded one another with the sort of distrust that comes from having been shot at for a living for periods of time bordering on the statistically improbable. On any other planet they would have been called psychopaths. On Pandora, they were Vault Hunters.

“So, fellow Vault Hunters, yeah? We gonna do an ice-breaker thingy or am I going to have to call you by whatever pops into my head?” The man in the military uniformed leaned casually against the wall, gesturing at the group.

They looked at one another, faces a mix of confusion, amusement and blank faceplate. 

“Ok, you’re gonna be Sexy, you’re gonna be Angry, and you’re gonna be… Bob.”

The woman cracked a smile at that. “Siren here. The name’s Maya. Nice to meet you all. If anyone tries to capture me, I'll incinerate their brain.”

The soldier whistled. “No shit? Well, I’m not getting on her bad side. I’m Axton, by the way. Ten years of Dahl military experience at your service.”

“My name is Salvador. I shoot things good.”

“That’s… that’s real descriptive there. And uh, Bob? You got an actual name or am I going to live out my life’s fantasy of naming a living person without having to breed or otherwise bear the responsibility of raising a kid?”

The slender, armoured figure stood motionlessly for a moment. Then its faceplate flashed red, projecting the holo of a single numeral.

“Zero? Whatever rocks your mystery boat, buddy.”

Two bizarrely shaped hands came up and despite missing a finger, succeeded in flipping Axton off. The shortest of the group laughed.

“Him, I like! He can stay.”

“So what brings everyone to lovely Pandora? I mean other than money, power and a godawful amount of guns?”

“I’m looking for more information on Siren’s. I know there have been at least two sighted on this planet in the past five years, I figure that’s a good place to start.”

“I live here. I am going to kill every Hyperion employee I can find, and then retire with the money from the vault.”

Maya and Axton exchanged a look, before she asked, “Uh, Sal? You know this is a Hyperion train?”

“Oh yah. I got no problem letting them bring me closer to the Vault. I can always kill them all later. Also, no employees around.”

“Eh, he’s got a point,” she shrugged and turned to the silent one. “Zero?”

“I am here to kill. And to seek a true challenge. Also, for phat lewt.”

“Lord above, it speeaaaks!” intoned Axton. “Funny way of talking though.”

Zero’s faceplate flashed again, eloquently displaying “XP.”

“Axton?”

“Yeah, what?”

“Your motivations?”

“Oh, right! You know, cover myself in glory, money, hot men and women and the blood of my enemies. Preferably simultaneously. No wait, minus the blood. I still want that though. Just before or after the sexytimes.”

The rest of the group just sort of stared at him. “Was it something I said? It’s usually something I said.” 

There was a sudden CRASH-CLANG and the whole train vibrated violently.

“Did we just… hit something?”

“Iunno. Still moving though, couldn’t have been important.”

“I get the feeling crushing a car accidentally might be important.”

Salvador blinked at Maya for a second. “Oh right! You’re new here. It’s not, don’t worry about it.”

The vibrations ceased and a strange creaking could be heard in the compartment. Turning, Axton was in time to see the friendly Jack billboard fall down, revealing a rather more hostile one, completing the greeting,

“Welcome, Vault Hunters! To your doom. (Nothing personal.)”

Two loader bots unfolded from what the Hunters had assumed to be cargo crates and aimed weapons. 

“Get in cover!” yelled the former soldier, sprinting down the compartment, waving the others ahead of him. Zero leapt upwards, deftly unlocking and opening a hatch in one movement. Salvador threw himself straight outside and only Maya did anything remotely sane and ran for cover. Axton slid into cover and flipped out his turret onto the roof. 

“Get ‘em girl!” he called out as his best friend in the galaxy unloaded lead. A moment later his rocket launcher digistructed and Axton was firing it down the compartment. The projectile ripped through the air, blowing Maya’s hair across her face and detonated square in a loader’s torso.

The other was almost immediately snared in some kind of energy field. Belatedly, Axton noticed a similar field around Maya’s hand as she tossed the loader out the door and past Salvador’s face. 

Axton cursed himself for not keeping his launcher fully loaded. While he fought with a catch, the near-midget threw himself back into the compartment, digistructing a minigun in each hand. _You have GOT to be kidding me._

Between Axton’s turret and Salvador’s obscene rate of fire, the mass of unfolding loaders quickly tumbled into shrapnel. Thumps sounded from above and he could only assume Zero was conducting business outside. Heads eventually popped up, or in Zero’s case, down. 

“Whaddya know?” Axton asked, stowing his launcher for a rifle and grinning at Salvador. “He shot things good.”

“What do you say we check out the conductor’s compartment, get some answers about this murderous ride?”

“I agree with the spooky lady,” said Salvador, hoisting both miniguns.

With Zero dropping to the floor and drawing _Is that a fucking sword? Seriously? SERIOUSLY?_ a sword, their group was re-assembled. Axton racked the slide of his rifle, nodded at the door and then kicked the thing in.

“Everybody hands-uuuoooOOH CRAP.”

“It’s cute how y’all think you’re the heroes of this little adventure, but you’re not.” Even as the doll of handsome Jack was turning around, the Hunters were retreating. Retreating being the tactical way of saying “running screaming.”

“Welcome to Pandora, kiddos.”

And that was how several kilotons of blasting powder kicked off the longest killing spree slash war crime slash corpse buffet slash epically-realized revenge-cum-sexual fantasy in the history of the Borderlands.


	2. Blindsided

Deep in the Windshear Wastes, fires burned. They burned briefly, and desultorily, in the manner of fires accidentally set and since forgotten. But by the light they shed, it was possible to see a bit through the snowstorm. And by the warmth they gave off, it was possible to stay alive. 

Salvador kicked at the side of the last member of the group he’d dragged free of the wreckage. 

“Hey, Axton. Wakey-wakey pretty boy.”

A soft groan rose from behind him. Maya was evidently coming around. Ditching the soldier he turned and moved to her side. 

“Heya chica. You gonna be ok?” 

Her eyes fluttered open and she drew in a sucking gasp of breath. Blood clotted half her face and a rough bandage made from bits of Salvador’s shirt was wrapped around her head. It wasn’t like it was doing too good a job of keeping him warm out here and she was clearly the worst off. Zero had awoken first and immediately patted himself down in a panic. Salvador knew the feeling. The explosion had wrecked all of his gear, all of his beautiful, beautiful guns.

“S-Salvador?”

“That’s me,” the hairy man confirmed. “Seems we all made it. Axton’s still out though.”

“Acshtun’s doin’ qui’ good fank you very mush,” the taller man was pushing himself to his feet. “Why’s m’ faysh all numb?”

“I dragged you from the train through a blizzard.”

“Tha’ could do it,” Axton nodded, massaging at his face. “We all good?”

Zero materialized from the blizzard, completing their party. Looking at Salvador, he shook his head. The near-midget sighed,

“So, good news bad news time, yeah? The good news is we’re all alive! The bad news is all our crap is junked.”

Axton grabbed at the module containing his turret and sure enough, it was a sparking wreck. “Aw, no, baby-girl, come on talk to me, talk to me. Damn that bastard Jack, he’s gonna pay for what he did to you.”

Maya looked to be struggling to focus, so Salvador snapped his fingers in front of her face. She blinked in irritation and waved his hand away. “I’m not sure… but I think I’ve got a concussion.”

“Hell, that explosion, we’re lucky we’re not all dead. Though the blizzard might still kill us off. We should-”

“Hark, a sound nearby. We should go investigate. Could be help; or death.”

The vault hunters cocked their heads to listen for the noise Zero identified. Sure enough, regular crunching could be heard. With a shared look, the group reluctantly made their way to the source of the noise and found a little yellow robot.

“Hey! You guys aren’t dead! Yesss! Claptrap, your metaphorical ship has come in! Allow me to-”

“Yeah yeah, that’s great.” Salvador interrupted. “But we’re fucking freezing out here, is there somewhere we can go to warm up?”

“Oh, sure, let’s go to my place! But first, take these ECHO communicators that I totally didn’t just loot off these corpses!”

The robot handed out a bunch of devices and the Hunters attached them to their persons. Sal and Maya started in shock as they booted up, and Axton gave a delighted laugh.

“Hey, this a Dahl mark 12! Man, it’s good to have some decent tech again. Uh, Sal, you ok there buddy?”

The gunzerker was prodding at mid-air. “There’s floating lines and stuff.”

As the group started to follow the little robot, Axton explained, “Yeah, it’s called a heads-up display. This one’s got a self-scribing minimap, ammo counter, health monitor and retical that auto-syncs to your weapons.”

Salvador gave the other man a look of wonder. “You mean it shows me where I am aiming?”

“Uh. Yes?” Axton’s face was a study in weirded-out concern as Salvador reverently held the ECHO device. “How the hell were you planning on killing your way across Pandora without one?”

“Pick a direction and go?”

Maya gave a tiny, hysterical laugh through chattering teeth at that, before being cut short by a transmission interposing itself on all of their HUDs. 

“Is… anyone else seeing the grainy chick telling us not to be worried and she can help?”

“Ah-yup.”

“Does anyone else believe her?”

“Well, we’re not being bombarded with loaders, missiles or worse, so she’s probably not working with Jack?”

“Eh, fair point.”

The blizzard began to abate and a short ways off the Hunters could see a… well, structure would be stretching the word. A huge pile of junk was strung with bizarrely welcoming lights in a multitude of colours. The little robot let them in and they were hit with a wave of slightly less cold air. Immediately, the group fell apart, trying to jam past each other through the door. When they arrive at the bottom of the slope, a tangled mess of limbs, Claptrap was there to welcome them amongst piles of burning rubbish and slaughtered corpses. Almost enthroned amongst them and backlit by the roaring furnace, Claptrap looked ominous and threatening.

“Sorry about the mess. Everything Handsome Jack kills, he dumps here - bandits, Vault hunters, Claptrap units. If I sound pleased about this, it’s only because my programmers made this my default tone of voice! I’m actually quite depressed!”

The group untangled themselves and looked around. The place was actually sort of homey, in a pathetic, dilapidated and demented way. Sal helped himself to a jacket off a corpse, while Axton helped Maya to her feet. She accepted a slightly cleaner jacket from the short man as well. Aside, Zero lifted a flattened bit of cardboard with his sword, and immediately let it drop, regretful.

The crew were interrupted from their happy activities of ignoring everything Claptrap said when a roar heralded the appearance of an enourmous ape-thing, crashing down and ripping the eye straight out of Claptrap’s case.

“Aggghh! My eye!”

"Holy SHIT I thought you said this place was safe. Never occured to you to SEAL THE FRIGGIN' ROOF?"

"Get... the gun... the gun in the cabinet."

Salvador's face lit up at the mention of a gun and immediately ran off looking for a cabinet. Behind him, he could hear Axton suggest searching the place for anything useful. He found the steel grey cabinet and nearly wrenched the door off its hinges. Inside lay a dingy, gunmetal gray repeater, but right now it looked like the most beautiful thing in the world. 

"I have a gun!" 

"That's great, Sal. so between the lot of us, we've got a single pistol, a sword, and an axe I use to _make camp_. Good thing we've got a siren on our side, that levitation trick should come in handy..."

"Uh, I'm not sure I can manage that." Maya winced and put a hand to her head. She gestured at Claptrap and while a blue corona surrounded her hand, nothing happened. 

"Welp." 

"You've got the gun? Great! Apart from the excruciating pain, this is great! I’ve always wanted to have a mighty vault hunter helping me out! I will be your wise leader, and you - you shall be my fearless minion!"

"Yeah, we're not going anywhere until we've had a chance to warm up." 

"But, but, but...! Minions!"

* * *

Eventually, the group travelled out into the wastes, marginally warmer and better equipped than they were an hour ago. Wandering through the high-walled wastes, they encountered ruined Hyperion containers, filled with money and ammunition. Guns went undiscovered, until Axton accidentally kicked over a frozen pile of something he didn't want to think too hard about.

"Hey, check it! An smg! Who the hell just leaves guns lying around?"

"This is Pandora, amigo. There are more guns than there are people." Sal watched the other man clean the gun off in the snow and remarked, "Especially since the bandits started making their own. That's one there."

With a rough and forceful yank, Axton cleared the chamber. "Well, looks like it'll fire, at least." 

He fished out a pair of mags and slammed them into the receivers before tossing it to a surpised Maya. "I'm... not sure if I'm the best choice for this thing right now, the concussion..."

"The concussion's why you're not going into melee with whatever we find out here." Axton flipped his tomahawk in the air and caught it. "You and Sal shoot things, Zero and I will dice them if they get too close."

"'Zero and I?' Ha, I will suffice, solo. You move too slowly."

"Sweet, free ride for me!"

It was only minutes later that the group encountered their first threats, the bullymongs of the wastes. It was thirty seconds and several mags of ammo later that it became apparent that Axton and Zero's services probably wouldn't be needed. Sal looked longingly at the gun Maya was reloading.

"Trade?"

"You wish!"

The first obstacle came when claptrap fell clear off a cliff and Axton spent a good few minutes trying to wrestle the damn robot out of his crater while everyone else slaughtered rabid bullymongs. Finally, with a crunch, he managed to pop the robot clear and sat down heavily to watch the murder.

"Hey, minion, tell me what's happening! I hear gunfire."

"Well, uh, Sal's picking his shots, going for the head with your pistol, Maya appears to have given up trying to aim that piece of shit and is just putting as much lead down range as possible and Zero is... jesus christ, Zero wasn't kidding about me not being needed."

"Aw come on, minion, you gotta give the descriptions some panache! Where's the drama? The action!"

"I'm a soldier, not your damn narrator!"

* * *

The second obstacle was, naturally, Knuckledragger. The wrecked automobile crashed to the ground in front of them and it quickly became clear that Axton was going to have to pull some semblance of weight here. While the others emptied a platoon's worth of fire into the beast and slashed at its limbs, he tried to get it's attention, or at least distract it.

"Hey! Over here, ya steroid-munching freak of nature! Look at the dude waving his arms like an idiot! Check me out! Oh for-"

His frustration at his impotence mounting, the soldier hauled back and whipped his tomahawk at the thing's backside with a screamed "HEY!"

 _That_ got its attention, the head of the axe burying itself in the thing's ass. With a ridiculous yelp, Knuckledragger's head came around, eye narrowing on Axton.

"This... is gonna hurt." The massive backhand caught Axton full in the side and crumpled him into the ice cliff. Wheezing, he managed, "Yep. That hurt." 

The huge 'mong reared up above him, four arms raised to pound him into pulp. It roared its intent, even as bullets ripped into its back. The roar rose in fury and volume, spittle spattering across Axton's face and the soldier grimaced, trying to turn away. Then roar turned into a gurgle and the spittle turned to blood and Axton peeked back around. Knuckledragger collapsed to the ground, Zero surfing his corpse. He pulled both his sword and Axton's axe out of the thing's flesh and tossed the tomahawk back to its owner.

"Great timing. Thanks, dude."

Behind them, Maya fired a desultory burst at the retreating bullymong forms, encouraging them on their way. When Zero and Axton rejoined them, the group followed Claptrap up to the barge. After Claptrap managed to lock them out and Angel managed to undo the damage the little wheeling piece of junk seemed to cause just by _talking_ , they got through.

Inside, untouched by the ravages of the ice, containers filled the hold. The Vault Hunters stocked up, jamming ammo into their inventories and health hypos into their arms. Salvador inspected the massive Hyperiod chest in the center of the room and pushed a button on the side. With due drama, the container hissed open, revealing its spoils. The short man's eyes lit up at the prize. Before he could claim it though, Axton reached over the lid and snatched up the shotgun.

"Oh thank GOD, a real weapon, finally!"

To the sounds of Salvador's groaning, the intrepid adventurers entered Liar's Berg.


	3. Of Liars and Captains

The party clambered out of the wreckage of the freighter and onto a massive cliff. Distantly, gunfire could be heard, but according to Salvador that was normal. 

“Keep your wits about you, minions. This glacier’s run by a bandit named Captain Flynt. The jerk kept me as his torture plaything for a few months. We played games like ‘dodge the blowtorch,’ and ‘don’t get dunked into the pool of acid.’ I was really good at the first one.”

That’s… that’s real charming Claptrap, thanks for sharing.”

“Hmm, it looks like Liar’s Berg has been overrun by bandits. How about we go down there and give my buddy Hammerlock a hand?”

The humans - or at least bipeds, word was still out on Zero - looked at each other and shrugged. Axton spoke for them,

“May as well, since we have to go through there anyways to get to Sanctuary.”

The bullymongs that had made camp on the outside of town presented a small problem to getting to the town gate, not in the least bit because a few of them seemed to be oozing some kind of hideous acid. Or, to put it as Maya did,

“Oh god, oh god, get it off, get it off, oh god this is disgusting ew, ew, ew!”

Claptrap slipped by as the vault hunters dunked her in a snowbank to wash off the crap and soon another human voice could be heard over the comms.

“Spectacular! First Captain Flynt’s bandits attack, then Claptrap shows up! I must have been horrifyingly cruel to puppies in a previous life to deserve this kind of treatment. I say, Vault Hunter, could you kill Flynt’s men for me?”

“...this guy sounds like a total fucking douche,” Salvador observed.

“Whatever, let’s just paint the town red and move on.” Four pairs of boots kicked the town gate in and three guns began a civil discussion in Pandoran with the bandits. Five minutes and a truly absurd amount of killing later, the dulcet tones of Claptrap’s screeching asked,

“Hey, Hammerlock! Since my minion just saved your town, you wanna do your bestie Claptrap a favor and repair my eye?!”

With a heaved sigh, he replied, “Yes, I suppose I am in your debt now, aren't I? Come to my shack, and I shall restore Claptrap's sight. First, I shall shut off the electrical fence for you.”

The eager little robot sped off to get through the gate, cutting short and invalidating Hammerlock’s admonition to let him through first. The gate proceeded to do its job and shock the life out of the poor little junkheap.

“I take it back, this guy I like!” 

“Apologies, but when Claptrap speaks, I feel my brain cells committing suicide, one by one. I shall be out directly.”

Once the robot was repaired and the introductions made, Hammerlock seated himself by the warmth of the generator and inquired as to the vault hunters’ plans. Since they involved simply cutting a red-stained path to Sanctuary and eventually Handsome Jack, the older gentleman gave them some advice.

“Please feel free to stay in Liar’s Berg for now and rest up. There are a few jobs I can think of that need doing and I can pay in guns.”

That was enough to sway Salvador and the rest of the party was convinced once Hammerlock stated that he knew enough medicine to treat Maya and get her up to using her powers again. 

“Righto, old man, what do you need?”

“Firstly, you young buck, for you to stop referring to me as an old man, lest you would care for a slap typically administered to female dogs delivered via a hydraulically powered steel armature.”

As the rest of the party just sort of blinked, Axton mouthed some words to himself silently and then started. “Oh! Gotcha.”

“Thank you. Now, the town could use some further extermination. Though Captain Flynt killed everyone in Liar's Berg, I see no reason that wild Bullymongs should lolligag about the place, disrespecting the memories of the former townsfolk. If you could clear the town of them, that would be most gentlemanly.”

“Well, we’ve been slaughtering the dumb things since we got here, I don’t see why we couldn’t manage a few more,” Maya said.

“Indeed dear lady, though I should point out that the best cure for a concussion include plenty of rest, so I would advise taking it easy.”

“Hey, I don’t need to be coddled!”

“And I do not intend to coddle you, there’s plenty else to do while these fine strapping young meatshields go about their murder business. There’s the issue of finding Helena Pierce’s audio logs and…”

* * *

The discussion of things to do lasted well into the night. While Maya handled the negotiations for rewards and the like, the men went looking for a place to crash. They lost Salvator to a customization station where he giggled himself silly trying new haircuts. 

“He is disturbed. Likely some childhood issue. Like one Napoleon.”

“Ha! Yeah, but so long as he keeps killing with us, I don’t give much of a damn. What about you, Zero, my man? You good to keep up with the gang? You’re probably going to want a gun sooner or later though…”

“Jack dies, no questions asked. A sniper round should suffice. Long range death for him.”

“Well, you can have the one from Hammerlock’s stupid hat job. That’ll get us all armed up properly... hey, hang on, these are Dahl parts. I can get to fixing the missus!”

And with that, Axton waded into a pile of scrap, rummaging around. Zero watched for a moment and then returned to looking for a decent abode.

“That one has issues. Likely some marital thing. Or compensating.”

“Hey, I heard that, sword polisher!”

* * *

The next day saw the extermination of Liar’s Berg’s bullymong population, the clearing out of the former Crimson Raider’s holdout and the single-minded burning of Blackburn Cove by an angry near-midget who didn’t get to ride the bullymong. As the little settlement sank into the freezing waters, Axton kept up a happy recollection of the fight across its rooftops with Midgemong, further irritating Salvador.

Zero just picked off rakk with his new sniper rifle. They didn’t get the chance to close.

By the time they got back to Liar’s Berg, the sun was setting. Settling into their temporary rooms at the bar, they found Maya and Hammerlock downstairs, getting teary-eyed over “some chickflick.”

“The poor girl has never had the chance to watch Love Actually! What a cruel upbringing!” was all Hammerlock had to say on the matter. Axton settled in to watch as well while tinkering with his turret module. Sal cracked open the fridge safe to find some rakk ale and stared forlornly at the gun vending machine he didn’t have money for while drinking the beer. No one really knew where Zero was, but the comforting _crack_ of a sniper rifle occasionally split the night sky.

He was back by morning, and so were Maya’s Siren powers. 

* * *

“Heyyyy minions! You're looking swank! Now, to get to Sanctuary, we've gotta retrieve my boat from the clutches of Captain Flynt. He's a real douche: dumb as a bag of wrenches, smells like old ham.”

“Yeap, sure thing-” and that’s when the voice of the Herr Captain cut over the comms.

“Here’s what’s gonna happen, Vault Hunter. My first mate Boom Boom is gonna kill ya, Jack’s gonna pay us, and I’m gonna play hopscotch in your chest cavity!”

“...I love this planet. Really, I do.”

“Why’s that then?”

“Because I am not going to feel a _smidgen_ of regret when I kill this dude.”

“People feel regret killing other people?”

“Sometimes Sal, sometimes.”

“Guys, where’s Zero?”

“He said something about covering us from up top.”

The group looked around and quickly found the highest point in the town, the top of Hammerlock’s shack. Starkly outlined against the snow was Zero, calmly waiting and holding the sniper rifle in a professional’s grip. He waved. They looked at the long, clear sightlines into the bandit camp and felt remarkably better. This would be a like a walk in the park

* * *

Before a double drawbridge and after a trail of corpses, Axton stopped the party.

“Hang on, does he seriously think ‘Butt Stallion’ is an insult?” he asked, wiping some gore off his axe.

“Uh, isn’t it?”

“I mean, sure, ‘Butt’ sounds kind of silly and kiddy, but I really can’t see how being called a Stallion is a bad thing. Unless you’re not into anal, I guess.”

“What do you mean anal and what does that have to do with stallions?”

Salvador and Axton shared of moment disbelief before Salvador ventured,

“I know I’m not supposed to ask this, but _how_ old are you?”

“Twenty-seven, why?”

“How the _hell_ did you get to twenty-seven without learning about _sex_?!” exploded Axton. “Did you grow up in a nunnery or something?”

“An abbey actually and what the hell does sex have to do with- oh! Ew! Ow! Why would you even _do_ that?!”

“Heeeeeeey don’t knock it until you’ve tried it babe.”

“Things I didn’t need to hear coming from a robot: that sentence, in that context.”

“Look, can we just kill this Boom-Boom dude?”

* * *

“JESUS CHRIST WHO GAVE THE BANDITS A FUCKING BATTLESHIP.”

Hunkered down behind rapidly eroding cover, Axton hurriedly reloaded his shotgun and rifle while Maya scrambled over to him, covered by erratic fire from Sal. 

“What do we do about that thing?!” she yelled over the bone-rattling sound of the explosions. 

“Gimme a second, I’m thinking.” Axton slammed another mag into the rifle and began to sorely wish for a proper Dahl rifle, not this wooden piece of Jacobs trash. A grenade from the Bewm midget landed nearby and while Maya scrabbled away from it panickedly, he up-ended one of Pandora’s ubiquitous mini-safes onto the thing and held it down. The resulting contained explosion shattered his shield, bruised several ribs, winded him and kicked him a good foot into the air, but was otherwise harmless.

“Right,” he coughed out, spitting up a bit of bloody phlegm. “Midget dies first. Hey! Hey, Sal! FUCK THE MIDGET!”

The Gunzerker grinned madly and pulled out another pistol and began pouring on the pain at the tiny bomber. His equally short stature made him a slightly harder to hit target. Axton cued Maya to pull a grenade while he did likewise. They popped and tossed them simultaneously, aiming for the general direction of the midget, not risking sticking a head out of cover. When Salvador ducked back and his cover erupted into a pillar of smoke and flame, Axton and Maya came out of cover and drilled the fleeing, hobbling midget through the chest.

“Next! Everyone go in a different direction! Zero, if you can hear me, POP THE FUCKER IN THE HEAD, WILL YOU?”

With that, Axton spun out of cover and hurled his turret past the battleship guns. Maya and Sal both came out of cover as well, and the trio dumped an unholy amount of firepower into the metal monstrosity. Someone must have hit something important, because seconds later, the thing blew sky-high.

There was a period of silence. 

“Think we got him?

“You killt mah bruthahdgsjkjurrrrgh!” came the reply, reminiscent of an angry man being run through with a sword. When the smoke cleared, Zero walked away from the corpse to examine the massive gate.

“Uh, thanks?”

Claptrap whined his way up to the gate and banged on it a few times. “Rakkin’ frakkin’ locked gate! Ooh, idea! Minions, get on that cannon!” 

The same idea had already occurred to Salvador, who sat grinning like a kid in the gunner’s seat. The others clambered up as Claptrap continued.

“Just blast this gate down, but DON’T do it until I’m out of the way! Understand? If you shot the gate now, that could cause serious damage to...”

“Is this really a good idea? I mean, we blew this thing up real good,” Maya pointed out.

“Well, the ship isn’t a sinking ruin, so I don’t think we hit any of the ammunition…”

At that point, Claptrap yelled, “SHOOT THE GATE WITH THE CANNON, NaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

The yelling, of course, came from the fact that in his haste to make a big boom, Salvador just blew the little robot away. 

The group stared at the crater where the robot used to be. Zero held out a hand for a high five, which Salvador quickly granted. Then the bandits came pouring through.

* * *

“Oh man, did you see that one guy’s leg? Totally decapitated the other dude!”

“Ahaha yeah! Oh man, that was a massacre. Literally! Wait, am I using that right…”

Their laughter was cut short with more ECHO communication.

“So, - I might have tried to stage a mutiny on Captain Flynt’s ship before the flash-freeze. Which explains why his men are currently beating the crap out of me. Right, guys?”

“Shut up!” came the reply from a distant bandit voice, even as the clang and clatter of robot abuse could be heard.

“Huh. He survived.”

“Unfortunate, that. It was an explosive death. A quick one, to boot.”

A sigh. “I guess we’re going to have to rescue him.”

The group looked at Maya in confusion. “Oh come on! He’s been sort of helpful… kind of?”

The guys shrugged and made for the massive fire-breathing dragon sculpture. 

* * *

They walked right past the little robot getting beat on by the three bandits. Of course, the bandits noticed, like ten seconds later that they were better dressed, better armed and weren’t screaming profanities, but those ten seconds were pretty hilarious. If only for Claptrap’s desperate pleas for them to save him.

* * *

“So answer me this.”

“Yeah?”

“How is it that these numbskulls can manage the engineering finesse and knowhow to build guns and erect a scaffolded shantytown on the side of a mountain/iceberg/ship… but they still keep their guns in the outhouses?”

“Beats me.”

“Hey, outhouses are a brilliant place for guns! You are more likely to get jumped when you are taking a dump!”

“Why does that sound like a radio jingle? Why am I not surprised that sounds like a radio jingle? What is WRONG with this planet?!”

Axton and Salvador both patted a shoulder of the siren. 

“You’ll get used to it.”

* * *

“Hey, who’s the sexy lady on these pictures?” Axton asked casually while emptying his pistol around the corner at some over-armoured bandit. Salvador looked up from reloading and grunted.

“Ah. Mad Moxxxi. Famous sexpot on Pandora, makes good business from it. Big hit with the bandits, miners, settlers, Dahl, Atlas, Hyperion…”

“So what you’re saying is that she gets around.”

“She is also kinda nuts, compadre. Earning that nickname. She gone through five husbands like a thresher through fertile soil.”

Salvador crawled over Axton while the soldier scooted over and took his turn to reload. Over the rattle of the the Pandoran’s gun, Axton asked,

“Do I want to know what a thresher is?”

* * *

“Come on out Flynt! Your Claptrap unit has returned!”

As the vents on the deck burst into flame, a rotund figure in the distance hauled itself off its makeshift throne. Yelling something, it began to wave an anchor around like it was a toothpick. Axton stepped forward.

“Sorry, couldn’t make that out! Could you speak up a bit?”

“I SAID, ‘It’s our new tortur-’”

“Sorry man, still not getting it, you’re too far away.” The soldier kept casually strolling forwards, around the burning industrial… things, while bandits and his fellow Vault Hunters looked on in disbelief.

“I SAID ‘IT’S OUR NEW TORTURE DOLLS, LET’S-’”

“Hey, whoa now, can’t we talk this out? I mean, we just walked up here after painting your camp red with the blood of all your ‘boys,’ maybe we don’t have to murder every last one of you, you know?”

“Ha! Bandits are a dime a dozen around here. Anyone who died wasn’t tough enough to cut it.”

“Ahh, I see, the old survival of the fittest human resources policy. Still, all we want is that boat and to get out of here.”

“Well you’re not getting it, grinder! Though if you behave, maybe I’ll tie you to the front of it like a figurehead! Haw-haw!”

Axton check his watch and gestured behind his back. “Well, I can see you’re committed to this line of action, so let’s get on with it, I guess.”

“What, did you really think you could _talk it out_ with Captain Flynt?!”

“Nah, I was just buying time for my turret to recharge.” He tossed the module out. “And for our sniper to get into position. POP ‘IM, ZEE!”

* * *

As Claptrap showed surprising skill in navigating the boat through the twists and turns of the iceberg-laden waters, the Vault Hunters relaxed on deck, watching the sun set under the icy waters.

“You are crazypants, you know that?”

“And that’s coming from the psychotic midget of our group, so yeah, you’ve got problems, Axton.”

“What? It worked, and it was badass.”

“You got shredded in the crossfire,” Maya’s face was screwed up in concentration as she held an orb of siren magic-stuff close to Axton’s chest. Axton’s bloody and very hole-y chest. “Nearly died.”

They had to drag him, bleeding and laughing like a maniac onto the boat. In punishment for his idiotic plan, he got last pick of the loot. 

“Hey, I still got plenty of them, and my girl filled Flynt full of SO MANY holes.”

Slowly, the siren pulled the orb away from his chest, and with it came a tiny bullet. Tossing it aside, she took out a syringe and jammed it into the soldier’s chest, emptying the nanofluid into him. Axton let his head loll back and sighed with relief.

“You got so many of them because they were _running over you._ ”

“Yeah man, _I_ couldn’t miss from that range.”

“Oh Sal, come on man, don’t sell yourself short. I’ve seen you miss from even closer range.”

That got him a punch to a newly-closed wound. 

“Ow, jesus, stop! Nurse! Nurse! He’s abusing me!”

That got him a slap upside his head. Then Zero just started poking his bandaged wounds with the barrel of his sniper rifle and the man known as Axton was buried under a mess of flailing, abusive limbs.

“Ow, fuck, ok! Ok! I give! I won’t pull anything that stupid again!”

The howling and beating died down as the Vault Hunters went back to watching the sun set. Which was a shame. The sounds of howling and beating made Claptrap almost feel like he was back home.


	4. Puts the ROMANCE in...

“So, wait, wait. Hang on. Stop. Hold on, voice in all our heads,” Salvador held up a hand for the party to pause. “Wait… hang on. Wait... You’re saying that in order to get ourselves a car, we need to go into that camp of murdering bandits and get a piece of a broken robot so you can hack this station.”

“Um, yes. That is more or less exactly what I said,” replied Angel, slightly confused and worried.

Salvador just beamed. “That’s cool, just wanted to make sure. I love you, voice in all our heads.”

Then with a manic bellow, he pulled out two guns and charged through the gaping maw of whatever the fuck reptile it was that acted as the gate to the camp. 

* * *

“Can we just agree,” yelled Maya down to Axton, “that we never let Salvador drive again?”

As the other runner hit a rock and spun through the air, spewing bullets in every direction, Axton considered the question. He considered it carefully, giving it the full benefit of his trained tactical mind as he eased off the gas to give the other runner plenty of space to land. It did so, with a crash that he felt even through the shocks. Wheels spinning in the mud and slush, the bright orange runner fishtailed in place, trying to find traction, before roaring off to ramp off another rock. Giving his runner a bit more gas, Axton maneuvered around the crater and rock before answering Maya.

“Would you rather,” he ventured, as Salvador turned a bullymong into _literal giblets_ , “that we let him play with a rocket launcher three times the size of any of us?”

The terrified silence that hid under the roar of the runner was all he needed to hear.

* * *

“You’ll never get in here alive, you- oh, hang on, it’s more Vault Hunters!”

The group leaned against their runners and looked between themselves, sporting looks of confusion, obliviousness or blankness. 

“...More?” asked Maya.

“Yeah! Some girl crash-landed in a pod right outside of Sanctuary. Roland sent her to go save Corporal Reiss and retrieve a power core that we needed.”

“And… she said she was a Vault Hunter?”

“Well, she did murderate that entire bandit camp that was holed up outside our door. Her and that scary-ass robot of hers.”

The group looked at the still-burning wreck of cabins and corpses and had to admit, that did look like the work of a psychotic murderer out to be paid in blood and guns. 

“Ok, but look, we’re here to, uh, join the Crimson Raiders? Yeah, that’s it.” said Axton after getting nods from the rest of the party. “Are you gonna let us in?”

“Um, I don’t know… Normally Roland handles all this stuff, but he went off-comms a while back after sending the girl after Reiss. I guess… look, I guess I need to put you to a test like he did with her? Since there’s four of you, why don’t you go and kill some Hyperion assassins we think are holed up in Southpaw Steam and Power!”

Another look at the party that resulted in nods and shrugs, and Axton responded, “Ok sure, we’ll go assassinate your assassins for you. Gives us a way point?”

* * *

“Ah, now there is a sight I missed!” Salvador exclaims, pulling up outside some kind of hole in the hill.

“Uh, what’s that?”

Salvador gestured at the creature pulling itself out of the little cave. “The majestical Pandoran skag. It is the official planetary scavenger, you know!”

The rest of the party stared in mild amusement at the beatific, nostalgic expression on Salvador’s face. 

“We play such games with them! Oh, my childhood!”

“Games? Seriously? Like what, fetch?” asked Maya, now actually curious.

“Nonono, stuff like chicken. I show you!” And he gunned the engine, speeding toward the skag. Just as the surprised half-dog, half reptile leapt out of the way, the near-midget hit the boosters and pasted the creature across the side of his runner. As he disappeared into the distance, Axton and Maya could hear him exclaim,

“I wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin!”

* * *

“Ok, so you know how I said this mission was a pointless waste of our time, and an insult to our abilities?”

The group looked at Axton, who was looting the body of one “Wot” formerly of Hyperion employ. He straightened and tossed an luridly-painted SMG at Maya. As the stats popped up on her HUD, she whistled.

“Yeah, I take that back. Let’s fuck these guys up.”

“We can do better. Kill each chump a certain way. Net better rewards.” Zero pointed at the mission brief hovering in their HUDs. 

“Coolio. So, you wanna pop this next dude?”

The assassin flashed him a thumbs-up. And the group continued through the power-plant. As soon as the doors began to open, a volley of grenades left the group, blowing a group of charging suicide psychos to pieces. Everyone except Zero opened up in a fusillade that destroyed the remaining enemies, and just as Oney was about to draw a bead on Salvador, a familiar _crack_ rang out, and his head exploded.

On Zero’s faceplate could be seen the word “OWND” as he de-stealthed. 

Salvador got the assassin’s pistol.

* * *

Reeth was supposed to be killed by a melee attack. The group decided the most efficient way to accomplish this was to shoot the fuck out of everything and then dogpile the diminuitive assassin. He died in mess of hacking swords and tomahawks and blunt object trauma from punches.

Zero got the Fremington’s Edge from his misshapen corpse.

“What an idiot. Could have bought some time with this. Oh well, mine now chump.”

* * *

The deformed lunatic known as Rouf was to be dealt with with a shotgun, but the amount the rat-mutant scampered about made it hard for anyone to land a hit. Finally Maya just snapped and caught him in a phaselock. His bullet-riddled corpse sagged the floor moments later. 

For lack of anyone else who wanted it, Axton claimed the Dog. Everyone agreed it suited him best.

* * *

“Is this how it always is on Pandora?” wondered Maya.

“Eh?” 

“We go somewhere, kill everything in sight and take their stuff?”

“Pretty much,” shrugged Salvador.

“There’s nothing more to it?”

“Like what?”

“Like… I came here to find out more about Sirens because I heard there was one here. So that’s a goal, a reason for living. This planet seems to have nothing going for it except guns and murder.”

Salvador sighed and hopped up onto one of the chairs lying around the entrance of the power plant. 

“Look, Maya, baby. Most people’s reason for keeping on living is to keep eating, keep fucking and keep drinking. Pandora’s no different. Except on Pandora, to stay in the keep living part, you need to keep killing, because all those things you wanna do are threatened by people who want to do them to you.

“So yeah, you got your goal and we got ours, that whole Kill Jack thing. That’s cool. But most people’s goals, the popular ones, are just as good, and just as hard to do on Pandora. Hence the guns. Because some motherfucker is going to want to fuck you, eat your flesh and drink your blood, not necessarily in that order.

Because this planet makes you go loco.”

Three pairs of eyes stared at the near-midget. It was the longest any of them had ever heard him speak and to boot, the words coming out of his mouth were almost profound. He hopped off the chair.

“Now, we done philosophizing? ‘Cuz I wanna get back to guns and murder.”

* * *

The race back to Santuary’s gate was easily won by Axton and Maya, on account of the fact that Axton could actually _drive_ , but the time it takes Zero and Salvador to catch up was surprisingly less than expected. That is, until Zero got out of the driver’s seat. Sal just shrugged.

“He kicked me out.”

“Right. Hey, Lieutenant Whatsyerface, we killed your assassins let us in already!”

“Really? Cool! Here, lemme get the gate for you.” As the grinding groan of the gates opening precluded anyone actually speaking, the group stood or sat in their cars, tapping feet, drumming fingers or otherwise being impatient. Then they became aware of a roaring behind them, and turned to see another runner approaching at speed through past the steam pumps. It hit the hill by the road and ramped off it, soaring above their heads and lodging in the shoddy shantytown.

A tiny figure clambered out and jumped to the ground with a pronounced “oof!” Then it hopped up, pointing at the group,

“I say MECHRO, you say MANCER! MECHRO…” the group stared at her, unbelieving. “You guys suck!”

That’s when Lt. Davis cut in. “Oh great, you’re all here! That’s convenient.”

Axton looked between the tiny holo and the girl. “THIS is the other vault hunter? She’s a friggin’ kid!”

Moments later he was hopping and howling from a kick aimed right at his shin.

* * *

“...and then the escape pod crashed right outside Sanctuary! Convenient, eh?”

Gaige was explaining her “origin story” as she called it while the group slogged their tired asses carrying the fuel cells around. Axton rested the one he was carrying on the ground.

“Is no one else gonna take issue with the fact that the newest Vault Hunter is just out of high school and has literally one day’s experience with a gun? Anybody?”

“Hey, fuck you, I’m a quick learner!” Gaige digistructed an SMG and pointed at the barrel. “Bullets come out this end. Point this end at the baddies.”

Sal gave a chuckle. “That is how we teach children here, yes. She do fine. Besides, she killed all those bandits, yeah?”

“Yeah! Though I had some help from my best bud Deathtrap.”

“Yeah, you keep mentioning this robot. Where is he?” Maya asked.

“Oh man, I was waiting for someone to ask! Come on out, boy!” Gaige held up her robotic arm and curled her fingers into a trembling fist. The manic, homicidal glee on her face was promising. As the fist began to glow, a towering torso digistructed around her, coalescing into a massive battle robot.

“Holy shit!” exclaimed Axton, scrambling for cover.

“Yeah, run in terror, puny human! Flee the might of the terrible Mechromancer!” Gaige giggled. “Nah, just playin’. Deathtrap’s cool, ain’t you boy?”

She patted him on the side. “Oh! While you’re here, how about carrying this stuff for us, hmm?”

With they went back to their fetch quest, Axton trailing warily. After jamming the first one in, the idiot mechanic’s voice cut back in.

“Roland said we gotta have an exit strategery just in case he ever disappeared, hence all the fuel cells and whatnot. Bummer, though, he really wanted to meet ya. Raiders ain’t gonna last without some new blood, and given how you shot them bandits up I’d say you and blood got an extra-special relationship! Like cousins takin' a bath together! Eheheh...oh.”

The group exchanged glances.

“Great. We’re in Hickville. I crossed the galaxy to land in Hickville again.” Maya put a hand to her head, massaging away a headache she was sure was to come. 

“What? You don’t get with your cousins off-planet?” Salvador asked, to the weary incredulity of the band.

“Things about this place are becoming clearer by the minute. I liked it better when everything was foggier and trying to kill me.”

“Cheer up, Ax-chin! Things’ll try to kill you again soon enough!”

“...Ax-chin? Seriously kid, keep this up and I might accidentally prime on of your grenades while it’s still on your belt.”

“Oh come on, lighten up, you grumpy sack of testosterone and machismo.”

“Can we just plug the rest of these things in and, I dunno, crash?”

When the final fuel cell was finally inserted into the final hole (“heheh, hole.” “Sal…”), Scooter came over the ECHO comms,

“Thanks for cyclin' all that stuff for me. Third degree burns are best taken in shifts. Now, to see the fruits of your loins; this city's gonna FLY!”

A deep rumbling sounded from the ground beneath their feet and the city of Sanctuary trembled in its moorings. A great whine was heard and a sensation like colossus straining ran through every citizen of the rebel hideout. And then… nothing.

“This is a metaphor for something. I just don’t know what yet,” Maya remarked.

“Fuck it, let’s find this base and go to fucking sleep. The sun’s setting and I legitimately do not give two fucks about anything that isn’t a pillow at this point.”

Axton led the way to the way point, which was thankfully close. Cutting off the Crimson Raider, he snatched the key and unlocked the door.

“Don’t worry about the princess, he gets grumpy when he doesn’t have his beauty sleep.” Gaige stage-whispered to the guard.

“I fucking _heard_ that, shrimp!!”

* * *

Inside were rows of beds that Axton wasted no time in collapsing on, face first. The rest piled into the room behind him.

“Cozy,” remarked Maya, looking past the flapping banners at the flapping laundry. Salvador moved some bottles off a crate and looked in, his face lighting up at the piles of munitions. Zero zeroed in on a recorder and hit play.

“Hey, soldier. If you’re hearing this, I’m in trouble. Right now, you’re the only thing standing between this city - hell, the whole planet - and Handsome Jack’s army. I left info about my whereabouts in my safe. You can use it to store anything you need. This is your home, now. Good luck.”

“Great,” mumbled Axton through his pillow. “New mission. In the morning. Sleep now.”

* * *

“...bacon is for sycophants, and products of incest.”

Sal slowly opened his eyes and searched for the person speaking this heresy. The base had another occupant, a pretty lady, waving around a recorder and being stared at in apparent adoration by Gaige.

“Who speaks these lies,” he growled. 

“Oh, Salvador! You’re up! This is Tannis, she’s like the head scientist around here and she is _so cool_ she does experiments on eridium and people and sandwiches which taste alright and-”

Salvador tuned out the rambling girl and stuck out his hand. “Pleased to meetchu.”

Tannis took one look at his paw and ran for the sink, looking like she was going to hurl. Sal looked at his hand in confusion.

“What? I just washed two days ago.”

“Ehn, she does that apparently. Zero made her scream, Maya caused a nose bleed, but she propositioned Axton, the douche.” Gaige made a face.

“...and you?”

“She seems fine with me, so long as I’m like, four feet away. Otherwise she starts to twitch. Speaking of twitching, here!” Gaige shoved a pot of coffee under Sal’s nose. “This the gooooood shit!”

Sal accepted the pot and began drinking from it. Rivulets ran down his beard and stained his already hideous shirt, but he didn’t seem to notice. Or care. Smacking his lips, he asked,

“Any food?”

“Disgusting gruel and rations, unless you want to blow money in town. I didn’t, so I punked up and chowed down. Oh man, this town’s great. There’s Marcus who showed me how to use elemental weapons properly and gave me a bunch of money for testing them out so I bought this hella schway shotgun and then there’s Doctor Zed who fixes people up even though he’s not a real doctor and he let me be his operating assistant and we totally killed some dude on his operating table and oh! there’s Moxxxi who is a hella fine lady who Axton hit on and she soaked him with the soda pump and Sir Hammerlock was there and he laughed too and he says you all fought like mega badasses to get here no wonder Axton resents me so much and oh yeah he shoved me in a closet with Claptrap and called it initiation and are you done with that coffee?”

Salvador took another sip and climbed out of bed, moving to where Gaige pointed at the rations. 

“No, but I think you are.”

“Dude!”

“Silence, pig-tailed child. The hairy native is correct, your caffeine intake has been quite sufficient. Now, if you were serious earlier about assisting me with my experiments, watch carefully.”

Sal opened the locker Gaige pointed to and picked up a bar wrapped in plastic. Unwrapping it, he stared at the bland-looking beige thing inside. Then he shrugged and bit into it. Gnawing on it for a while, he took another sip of coffee and swirled the mixture around in his mouth. Swallowing, he settled on an adjective.

“Revolting.”

He wandered out, still munching on the ration and drinking from the pot.

* * *

Sal had to admit, Sanctuary was a lot nicer than his old town. Better buildings, not as much shit in the streets, fewer corpses. No corpses actually, which was pretty surprising for Pandora. He guessed it had something to do with the Crimson Raiders being ex-Atlas. And Sanctuary being ex-Dahl. Corporations were dickbags, but they were clean. As a mark of respect, he tossed the wrapper ration at a dumpster that no one was rooting through. He missed, but he did that often. It was the thought that counted.

He bought some skag skewers for a ridiculous amount of cash, but reflected that he was making enough now to afford them. Murdering bandits and taking their stuff was a profitable enterprise. Munching on the skewers, he wandered through town and eventually turned into a store where he heard a gunshot and screaming from. “Marcus Munitions Inc.” Oh yeah, he’d heard of this guy. Owned all the vending machines.

Stepping over the howling man clutching his blown-out knee, Sal perused Mr. Marcus’ inventory and settled on a nice Torgue shotgun. Never knew when you needed to blow something up, after all. Again, he paid a ridiculous amount of money, but he haggled it down with some old Pandoran tricks (“Threats, Sal. They’re called threats.”)

Sal was a happy man. He had guns, food and now wanted drink. Which meant there was really only one place to go. The bar. Which in Sanctuary, apparently meant Moxxxi’s. Just as he was about to enter, a voice shattered his hopes and dreams of being completely shitfaced before noon.

“Hey Salvador,” called Maya over the ECHO comms. “We’ve got a new job out somewhere called Frostburn canyon. Meet at the gate?”

A sad, world-weary sigh. “Yeah, yeah. See you in five.”

Alcohol would have to wait. A maniac’s job was never done. 

* * *

"Hey! Where the hell's the coffee pot?!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i swear to fuck, if anyone calls Gaige "girlfriend mode" around me one more time i am going to beat them with my chair


	5. Fire on the Streets, Madness in the Sheets

“Well this is new.”

“What do you mean?”

The four, nowait, five now, vault hunters stood at the top of a hill watching a large gang of bandits throw themselves at the firey defenses of a rival bandit gang.  
“Bandits are running screaming away from us…” elaborated Axton.

“But we’re not shooting them,” finished Maya.

“Oh,” said Gaige, not sure that she followed. 

“That’s weird,” cut in Angel's voice over the comms. “The Bloodshot bandit clan seems to be attacking the Firehawk’s lair. They’ve probably left landmarks for their reinforcements, those should lead you to the Firehawk. That, or just...follow the screaming.”

“Following the screaming! Gotcha.

* * *

At the bottom of the hill, Axton quickly found himself getting acquainted with another of Pandora’s lovely inbred mutations.

“WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!” he shrieked, running screaming from a hulking figure whose head dangled from an elongated spine.

“Ah. Goliath. They do not like it when you shoot off their helmets,” commented Salvador helpfully.

“ZERO! I SWEAR TO GOD IF YOU SHOOT OFF ANOTHER ONE OF THEIR HELMETS I AM GOING TO-”

*SPTAAANNNNG*

“Goddammit.”

“They fight each other. Suck it up, you big sissy. Suck it up and shoot.”

* * *

“This is unusual. The Firehawk has harassed the Bloodshots for some time but they have never mounted such a large scale assault on the Firehawk before. I wonder what's given them such confidence?”

“You’re looking for logic from a bunch of lunatics that call themselves the Bloodshots and casually talk about ripping organs out and choking people with them?” Maya asked their disembodied voice.

“...Fair point.”

The siren returned her attention to where the others were clearing a pile of bodies from the path. 

“For the last time, Sal, the flamethrowers stop working after we blow their gas tanks up.”

“Can we please maybe not to be blowing up their tanks?”

“Can you actually bother to aim, because the ninja and me have no problem hitting what we point our guns at. It’s you and the shrimp that have issues with that.”

“Ah, don’t listen to the grump. When we get a second, I’ll build you a flamethrower, Sal!”

“You are my new best friend Gauge.”

“It’s Gaige.”

“How the hell can you tell how he was spelling it?” asked Maya.

The rest of the group between her and the clanking mass of guns on Salvador’s person with a general expression of “Seriously?” Zero’s faceplate even flashed “WTF.”

“Right. Can we please get this carnival of carnage on the road again?”

With the promise of eminent violence and death, the sound of a half dozen guns loading filled the caverns.

* * *

“Just follow the screaming, she said.” grumbled Axton in a manner that the others might have called whining.

“I also suggested following the totems."

“And Sal said he saw one down this way!”

“I am sorry, it was only a dude being eaten by spiderants. But I did find this sweet new gun!”

“The dude was also the screaming,” chimed in Gaige helpfully.

“And now we are knee-deep in spiderants and their nests.”

“Guys I know we run on bullets and inter-party conflict, but if we can hold off on that, I think I see the way out up ahead.”

* * *

“Alright,” stated Axton matter-of-factly, in marked contrast to the hectic melee that was happening on the other side of the boulder. “Sal is fired from the navigator position, Maya is fired from the navigator position and Zero barely fucking talks.”

“So what you’re saying is that either you or me have to handle the map… hold on a sec,” Gaige popped out of cover to empty an entire magazine into the general area of the most massive spiderant they’d ever seen.

“Is aiming a completely foreign concept to you?”

“Is shutting your stupid face in the middle of a firefight to you?”

“Right, that’s it, you’re navigating next, just so I can fire you too.”

“I’ll fire your- Hey! Deathtrap’s up!” With a yelp of joy, Gaige leapt to the top of the boulder they were hiding behind and pointed dramatically at the pyroclastic spiderant. “Go, boy! Kill!”

The commando just rolled his eyes.

* * *

“GAIGE!”

“YEAH?”

The pair sprinted through icy caverns as a pair of ‘roided up badass psychos chased them, buzzaxes singing.

“YOU’RE FUCKING FIRED!”

“NOTED!”

* * *

“You think the Firehawk’s got Roland, huh?”

“Oh great. Him.”

“Y’know, I heard the Firehawk liquifies bandits and drinks ‘em like flesh smoothies. But nah, I’m sure your bandit pal Roland’s just fine. Of course, if Roland hadn’t been such a dumbass in the first place, he... whoops. Almost spilled my seeecreeeet”

“You know, at this point, he is getting less menacing and more… irritating.”

By now the group had finally gotten back on track, and Axton even admitted that Gaige’s “shortcut” had worked… even if it had landed them square between to heaving, drooling mountains of murderous muscle. She was still fired, though.

Now they shot, exploded and stomped their way through another cluster of spiderant nests and listened to the dulcet tones of Jack mocking them.

“Lemme explain something. Even if you DO rescue Roland from this Firehawk guy, the Crimson Raiders ain’t exactly long for this world.”

“Holy crap, does this douche ever stop talking?” asked Gaige.

“No,” came the chorus from the others.

“You know what? I think you deserve a little hint: my secret involves y-”

“HOLY FUCKING MONK BALLS SHUT UP.” 

Maya looked a bit guilty at the sudden outburst, but only because bandits came charging out of the encampment below them to investigate.

* * *

After the bit with the barbecued psychos and tasting their own melting flesh, the group halted before their most challenging obstacle yet.

A single beam across a deep, spikey hole.

“I volunteer Axton to go first.”

“Nice try kid, but we’re not on Germany.”

Salvador poked his head over the drop and swallowed. “You know, I am ok with fighting my way out of the gut of a massive hungry spiderant, but this…”

“I hear ya, buddy. One misstep and…” Axton trailed off as Zero rested his rifle on his shoulder and casually sauntered across, not missing a step.

“...yeah thanks. I feel a lot better now. Not like every…” More words faded into sullen silence as Maya let out a deep breath, held her hands to the side, and gracefully stepped across like a gymnast taking people to school.

“...anyone else?”

“Ehn. Fukkit.” And Gaige went barreling across the beam at full speed, muttering “Fuckshitassfuckassfuckfuckfuckfuck.”

The two men were left on their side of the chasm, looking uncomfortable and thoroughly emasculated. It certainly didn’t help when Maya called across, “What? You guys afraid of a little drop and a sudden stop?”

“Hilarious, chica,” grunted the near-midget. “Ho-kay. Gauge did it, I can too.”

Stowing his guns, Salvador took up a position vaguely and comically resembling a sprinting start. A deep breath and then he charged. Hollering, he pumped his tiny legs as fast as they could go, purposefully not paying a whole lot of attention to the very narrow beam he was sprinting across. 

This was a bad idea.

“Oh shiiiiiiieee...!”

“Sal!”

“Salvador!”

“Sal!” came the shrieks and cries of his compatriots as the small man slipped and went over the side. Before he knew what he was doing, Axton dashed forward and leapt, arm outstretched to catch the gunzerker. His fingertips brushed against muddy boots… and closed on empty air. Landing roughly on his belly, the air was forced out of his lungs before he could dramatically scream, “No!”

Not that there was any point, as Sal hung in mid-air, caught in Maya’s phaselock. “Come _on_ , Axton, I can only hold this for so long!”

Blinking, the commando recovered himself. “Gotcha.”

With half his body gripping the beam as tightly as he could manage, he stretched his arm out and grabbed for Salvador. His first grab didn’t get a good hold on the man, but started him rotating. That was enough so that Sal could pathetically hold out his arm as far as midgetly possible. Hands clasped around wrists and Maya let the phaselock end.

“I think I’m gonna be sick.”

“Great. Think you can be sick after you crawl up and get across or… or you could just vomit into the pit now, that also works. So long as none gets on me.”

Eventually the small man clambered up the commando’s arm and onto the beam. Together they shimmied across, arms and legs wrapped petulantly around the steel lifeline.

“You two look ridiculous.”

“I swear to god, Gaige, I am going to shove that rifle so far up your c-”

“Axton!”

“What? She wants to be treated like an adult she gets treated like an adult!”

* * *

“I finally meet another Siren and she’s a junkie.”

Maya and Sal were sat on a crate while Zero kept watch for more Bloodshot assaults. Axton and Gaige were helping Lilith upright, who was curled up shivering around a chunk of Eridium. Slowly, the rock was melting and being absorbed into the body of the other siren.

Salvador wasn’t sure what to say, and so just patted her back.

“It’s not all bad. She’s friendly, and probably can tell you a little about Sirens, yeah?”

“Yeah, it’s just… not what I was expecting.” Maya gestured at the dirty and ragged woman, glowing with power. Her eyes eventually stopped rolling around and retained the same dangerous gleam of embers in a fireplace. Soon that too, faded.

“Ahhhh. Yeah… since the Vault opened, my Siren powers have been getting a little... awesome, thanks to this Eridium stuff. No idea why.” Maya put her head in her hands and Salvador patted her back again. “Now, let’s talk about rescuing my boyfriend. Well...ex-boyfriend.”

“Hangon. Are you telling me you’re, I mean, you were dating Roland?”

“Yeah, now, before the Bloodshots grabbed him, Roland was getting intel on the Vault, and…”

“Oooof,” winced Axton. “In a relationship with your CO. Never a good idea.”

“How the hell would you know?”

“I married mine.” The Vault Hunters went silent at that and just stared. “What? What?! Why is that so hard to believe?!”

“If we’re done talking about our personal lives, I was saying, I gotta head back to Sanctuary, keep the city in one piece while Roland's away. But first, I’m gonna teleport you into the Bloodshot Stronghold. That's where they're keeping Roland. You’ll catch ‘em by surprise and have a real advantage.” A girlish giggle. “It’ll be great. Hold still.”

The group gave a start when eldritch power began to cover them, warping the world around them. A sound like the groaning of ancient gods rose up around them, and for a moment, it felt like they were floating. Maya's heart leapt at the power on display. Maybe she did have something to learn here. Then, in a bright flash they were… across the cavern.

“...I just moved you, like, ten feet, didn’t I? Sorry. I’m still getting used to this.” Maya nearly screamed in frustration. “Reminds me, though: Bloodshot Stronghold is full of real tough customers. You might wanna train a bit before you take ‘em on.”

That declaration was met with general laughter.

* * *

Back in Santuary, the group sat down with Lilith for some “training.”

“Well, I’ve got two missions for you. One’s finding out about a Hyperion spy-”

“Another one? How many do they have?”

“Like, a lot. They’re a galactic corporation, they can afford them. Anyways, he’s been spying on me, so I need you to go and put a bullet or several in him before he reports anything back to Hyperion.”

“Right, assassination. Zero, you want that one? Pick anyone you want to go with you.”

Lilith looked between Axton and Maya. “You’re alright with her giving orders like that?”

The commando shrugged. “So long as people take my advice when the bullets start flying I don’t care who’s in charge the rest of the time."

“Cool. Anyways, the second one is… um. So I… kinda inspired a cult? And not the fun, ask-you-for-autographs kind.”

Maya’s head hit the table with a groan. After she raised it and waved off people’s expressions she said, “Continue…”

“Uh, yeah. I need you to infiltrate the Children of the Firehawk, and find out if they're planning anything shady. I'd do it myself but I'm kinda worried they'd freak out if they saw their god in person.”

“Yeah. That’s, uh, that’s kind of a problem, yeah. In other news, I’m going with Zero!”

Axton gave a barking laugh. “Yeah ok, this I gotta hear the story behind. I’m coming too.”

“Story? What story. There’s no story. Why would you think there’s a story.”

“Uh-huh. I’ll trade you the tale of my disastrous marriage for whatever’s got you worked up about this cult.”

“Oooh, I wanna hear abou-” Gaige shut up as the barrel of Axton’s shiny new Jacob’s rifle nearly jammed itself up her nose. “Orrr Sal and I could go check out the cult! Sure, that shouldn’t be too hard!”

* * *

“...and after that night we were pretty much going steady. I tell ya, gunpowder, booze and sex makes for one helluvan aphrodisiac.” Axton concluded the tale of how he and his wife got together with a bang, decapitating another snow skag with a shotgun blast.

“But… at that time, wasn’t she still, what do you call it, enlisted, like you?”

“Oh yeah, and we weren’t married yet, that came later. Hey, Zero, you found that Boll guy y-”

BANG.

“Ok then!”

* * *

“Hunh. Burning people alive is mildly shady, but these cultist sound like they want it. Which is weird. Do what he asks, I guess.”

“Hang on, hang on, hangonhangon.” Gaige held up her hands. “So to stop them from doing stuff like set other people on fire… you want me to go ahead and set them on fire.”

“Yep.”

“That is what she said, Gauge.”

The young woman paused, and considered her arsenal of custom-tuned rapid-firing, extremely small capacity weapons. At length she withdrew a bandit rifle, glimmering with gaudy fire decals and the glow of incendiary bullets.

“I hear and obey, Firehawk,” she intoned solemnly.

“...this might have been a mistake.”

* * *

“And so she gets on her knee, still done up in fancy dress uniform and proposes right there!”

“Despite you being still on fire and mostly naked?”

“Ah, it was just my hair. So when do I get to hear about this cult problem?”

“Ugh. Fine. So you know how I grew up in an abbey?”

“I seem to recall something along those lines, yeah. Hey! Found it!” Axton cried, nabbing the ECHO recorder from the industrial pipe, high in the gangways above Maya.

“Great. Get down here and we’ll go see if Zero’s found the other one yet. Anyways, those monks kinda ruled the world I was brought up on…”

“Seriously? How the hell do a bunch of monks get that kind of authority?”

“Byyyyy invoking the 'divine right' of Sirens and fear of our powers?”

“Dude.” Said Axton as he hopped into the turret. “I’m not sure if that’s awesome or if it sucks.”

* * *

“DIDN’T WE ALREADY KILL THIS GUY LIKE NINE LINE BREAKS BACK?!” Gaige screamed to be heard over the din of the Vladof gun in her hands.

“WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN, NINE LINE BREAKS BACK?” yelled Salvador as he unloaded two shotguns into Scorch’s underbelly.

“I DON’T KNOW, I GET KINDA META WHEN MY ANARCHY GETS HIGH ENOUGH!”

“WHAT THE HELL IS ANARCHY?!”

* * *

“And then I shot Harker in his dumb fucking face and walked out of there. Been travelling, looking for info on Sirens ever since.”

“That is some hardcore shit.”

“Yeah,” Maya trailed off as she hauled the runner around a corner. “So… _ex-_ wife?”

“Yeeeep. What, you think an ass like me could hold a decent woman for long?”

“At least you’re aware of it,” replied Maya, before stomping down on the brake. “Why is Zero soaking wet and surrounded by the remains of a runner?”

“I dunno. HEY ZERO, WHY ARE YOU SOAKING WET AND SURROUNDED BY THE REMAINS OF A RUNNER?”

The strange assassin just held up an ECHO recorder and a finger.

* * *

h3Y DuD32,

54l & M3h R 90Nn4 HiT UP T3H 50UTh3rn 5h3lf 42 p4Rt 0F t3H Wh0L3 KULT thin' 4nd 8uRN 4 mID93t 4liv3. PR0848LY 90NN4 cR45h tH3R3 T00. 54L 54Y2 h3 kN0W2 4 pl4C3

L4T3R!

“...What the _hell_ does this say?” 

Maya took the slip of paper from Axton and looked it over. “No idea. Zero?”

After a moment, the man(?) said, “It is old 1337 sp33k. You uncivilized plebs. Do you lack all skillz?”

“Jesus fucking christ, can’t she just ECHO us like a _normal person_?”

* * *

Gaige stared up at the massive, mechanical dragon maw while Salvador hung the midget from a meat hook.

“This… is a magnificent piece of goddamn art. Truly, we are doing god’s work here.”

“The Firehawk’s work,” cut in Lilith. “Oh goddammit, you've got me doing it too. Look, just get to the incinerator console and...give him what he wants, I guess.”

“You mean this lever?” Sal didn’t even bother to wait for confirmation.

* * *

“...and then, after she divorced and discharged me, Sarah not so subtly hinted that there’d be a firing squad coming and that I should absolutely under no circumstance make a run for it to the border worlds.”

“Harsh. But I guess she still liked you, at least enough to let you get away like that.”

“What can I say, I’m a likeable guy.”

The group of them had a booth at Moxxxi’s and were attempting to enjoy the beer that was served. Maya was seriously considering switching to something stronger. She’d heard of beer tasting like piss, but this was… well…

“Annnd since I’m such a likeable guy, I think I’m gonna push my luck with Tannis!”

“You’re what now?” The siren gave him a look that could best be described as "cut-eye."

“Hey, you heard her. ‘Hours of scientific insanity I could only imagine in my dreams or her bed, standing offer!’”

“And you seriously think ‘scientific insanity’ means you’re gonna get laid?”

“Hey, already happened once!”

“...We’ve been here one day! You were the first in bed!”

“And the first to rise! She was still working in her lab, so I put her to bed.” The commando’s eyebrows looked for all the world like they were trying to do the wave. 

“Oh my god.” Maya put her head in her hands and Axton left, laughing. “I am definitely going to need something stronger now.”

Like magic, Zero appeared, plunking down a bottle of something dark and viscous and two tumblers. 

“...Can you even drink?”

* * *

“We owe you our lives, Vault Hunters!”

“Yes! Worship the Vault Hunters! Worship the Queen in Steel and Fire! Worship the Beast of Many Guns!”

Gaige’s eyes gleamed with the madness of the newly deified.

“Uh… whoops. Come…come on back.”

Sal just shook his head at the mechromancer’s mad cackling.

* * *

The door to the front of Raider headquarters slammed open as if it had been kicked in by teenager with a god complex. A growling voice, rough with madness proclaimed,

“BOW DOWN PEONS TO THE QUEEN IN STEEL AND FI...er... 

Dude! What are you doing with my Auntie Tannis!”

“Ok, we are _totally_ getting our own rooms after today.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And the shipping begins.


	6. In Which No One Makes the Obvious pun

The next morning was something of a production, keeping Axton and Gaige apart for long enough to load everyone into runners to get to the Bloodshot Dam. It was eventually solved by Tannis marching out, demanding that everyone shut up or offer up their livers for human experimentation. Her declaration was undermined by the fact that she was clearly clad only in one of Axton’s jackets, but reinforced by the fact that it was covered in bloodstains and she was wielding the largest bonesaw any of them had ever seen.

They got into the runners real quick after that.

* * *

Three vehicles plowed through Three Horns at quite frankly suicidal speeds, constantly trying to edge each other out for first. One of the was trying its damnedest to wreck the one with the mercenary with his legs kicked up in the cupola, so it transpired that the the only runner actually running the race won.

It got the honour of honking its horn. Yep. The whole ludicrously fast race was for the honour of honking a horn at the gates of a bandit stronghold. No one was surprised.

They were, however, moderately shocked when a voice came over the ECHO to the effect of,

“Yeah, yeah, I'm openin' the gate.”

That surprise cleared up promptly, with whatever birdbrain was in charge ordering, “Hold it, idiot. That don't look like one o' our technicals. They're here for our hostage! Get ‘em!”

The issue then became one of surprise as a gaggle of bandits- “Look, you can’t call a group of bandits a gaggle.” “Why the hell not?” “It’s not dignifi… yeah ok, gaggle of bandits it is”- climbed the wall of the encampment and dropped down to face the fearless Vault Hunters.

“Seriously?!” Gaige exlaimed. “You are seriously sending like, eight dude to take on three armoured runners?”

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” came Maya’s response as she opened up with the machine gun on the front of her car. As the rattle of machine guns and rocket launchers finished accompanying the Vault Hunters rendition of “Blood Soaked Sands,” an unfortunately familiar voice came over the comms.

“Mm-mmm! You ain't gettin' in the dam that way, peppernip! The Bloodshots ain't lettin' you in without a truck like theirs. Go see my kin out in the Dust - she'll hook you up with some skeevy lookin' wheels, uh-huuuuh.”

Looks passed between the assembled hunters, before a near-midget bellowed, “ROOOOOAD TRIIIIIIP!”

And floored it for the desert.

* * *

“Name's Ellie! My brother Scooter told me you was comin'! Don't get many visitors around here, especially not ones so cute.”

The others pulled into the junkyard in time to her Ellie’s introduction and Salvador’s slack-jawed look of adoration as it passed between the humongous woman and the gorily dripping metal compactor. Most of the team put two and two together, except Zero, who thought in binary.

“Tryin' ta rescue your pal Roland from the dam, huh? I betcha could fool those Bloodshots if you drove up in one of their custom trucks. I got one right over yonder that I…crushed with the driver still inside.”

“Hey, it happens, we get it. Casual murder, some entertainment. We’re all about that,” said Axton, feet still up on the cupola. The entire drive over, he’d been demonstrating the virtues of being able to sleep absolutely fucking anywhere, on account of the fact that he had gotten so little sleep. Gaige had tried a new sport of trying to lob hot brass jackets down his shirt, but her aim wasn’t great to begin with.

“Yeah, that’s my bad. Well, I got a vanilla technical in the shop and most of the parts we need. Just gotta doll it up with the some more bandit trimmin’s: spikes, blood, skulls, that kinda thing. You could probably scavenge that stuff from the bandit patrols around here.” 

“We get to blow up vehicles?” asked Salvador, his eyes growing ever wider.

“Sure do, cutie.”

“That’s great and all, but as the only vaguely responsible one around here, do you have anything to drink? We’ve been driving for fucking ever across a desert to get here.”

“Yeah, come on in, honey. I got beer, beer, whiskey, more beer, and water. The beer’s free on account of it fallin’ off the back of a truck regularly, but you’re gonna have to shell out for the whiskey and water.”

“Point of order,” Axton raised his hand from the cupola. “Is the beer cold?”

Ellie gave him a look that communicated exactly how far down the foodchain she thought he was and replied, “This is a civ-i-lized part o’ Pandora, big mouth. ‘Course the beer’s cold. Point of order, my jiggly white ass.”

“Yes it is.” said Salvador and Axton simultaneously.

* * *

After downing several beers and a bare minimum of water, the Vault Hunters were getting ready to engage in drunken vehicular manslaughter in Ellie’s garage when Axton barged in.

“Quick change of plans, guys. There is this kickass dude making Top Gun references outside and I just agreed to murder some dudes for him on account of the fact that his name is actually Kenny Loggins. Anyone coming with?”

The rest of the group sort of looked at him, before Gaige asked, “What the hell is Top Gun and who the hell is Kenny Loggins?”

Axton very nearly had a heart attack.

* * *

Their vehicular manslaughter now delayed by two and a half hours while Axton forced them to watch the cinematic and musical masterpiece that was Top Gun, the group split into two. Axton and Zero would hit the plateau, while the rest of them would actually get around to doing their damn jobs. And Zero was only going with because it offered access to the highest points for miles around and therefore prime sniping grounds.

So while two runners spread out around the dust to go and find some sober fool to commit murder upon, Axton stared at the pinnacle of a jagged spur of rock. Then he slowly put the car in reverse, backing down the length of the spur. At the base of it, he could be heard to whisper, “This will be my Everest.”

Zero could be seen signalling 9_9 from his visor.

Then Axton floored it, slamming the runner through its gears. Halfway up the rock, he slammed the lever that controlled the boost forward and took flight, G’s pulling at him. Pandora fell away below him and the sweet air of freedom whipped through his criminally short hair.

Zero drummed his fingers on the rim of the cupola.

Their impact flattened two bandits, a goliath and did things to the suspension that would make Scooter cry. And then the shooting started.

* * *

“No, Sal! Reverse! Rev- SHIT!” Maya slid down into the cupola as far as she could manage as a spinning sawblade whipped through the air where her head had been.

“What part of reverse don’t you fucking understand?!”

“The part where I am not going forward no more!”

“You’re stuck on rocks! You can’t go any more forward and WE ARE HUGE FREAKING TARGETS HERE.”

“Fine, fine, I will try this reverse thing. Hey, why did you stop shooting?”

“ARRRRGH!”

* * *

It was sometime later when Axton found himself up in the air again. It wasn’t by his design this time. Well, not entirely. Apparently taking up a position on the roof of a hangar to rain steel and fury down on idiot bandits was taken out of context by their Vulture pilots.

So one had tried to hipcheck him off the hangar, and thereby off the plateau. 

With a Vulture.

Moving at speed.

Now, thankfully, Axton was wrapped around the skid of the damn thing, so he wasn’t falling off but it was still a hella precarious position.

Zero took all this in while reloading his guns, having long dispatched the bandits on the ground. Axton was now trying to fend off the boot of a bandit trying to stomp on his fingers and the assassin calculated he had approximately twelve seconds left of that abuse before he succumbed. He called up various targeting algorithms while scanning his inventory for an appropriate weapon to down the Vulture.

Presently, he selected a battered Razrez Pooshka for its acidic, armour-eating properties and selected an algorithm that he’d had little use for, but that he’d renamed in his own inimitable way:

pHU(k j00Z 1'/\/\ 4 PhL4K (4|\||\|0|\| 

* * *

Gaige, on the other hand, was engaged in another timeless gaming tradition, known most commonly as camping. She’d discovered the cupola of a rocket launcher runner had a secondary firing mode that allowed it to lock on and fire a cluster of missile, greatly increasing her DPS, to the point where driving around just seemed like a waste of effort.

Also, sand was getting up her skirt and into her boxers and, just, ew.

So she parked her fine ass on an outcropping above a bunch of tire tracks and waited. And waited. And waited. She cracked another beer and reflected on the glories of a planet without an “of age” law. Then she waited some more.

And when finally some bandits came by on patrol, she casually held down the trigger for a lock, taking a long pull of the beer. The bandit technical immediately started evasive maneuvers and firing wildly. They were still in a slow, clunky piece of crap car though and their “evasive maneuvers” didn’t mean a whole lot to a girl raised on twitch-shooters and on a Ballmer peak.

When the technical blew, Gaige regarded her beer and the wreckage all the way at the bottom of the beer. Then she shrugged and kicked up her feet to wait for the next nublet. 

She may have gotten up to gather the parts had anyone pointed out how much she looked like a certain commando at that point.

* * *

When the rest finally got back to Ellie’s they found her and Axton commenting on the placement of some rather cheap figurines resembling her.

“No, I really think one should be on the Catch-A-Ride terminal. You want to draw people’s eye there, after all.”

“Huh. Guess you’re right. Gosh, Axton, thanks for the help! Didn’t think a hardened soldier had any expertise with interior design.”

“Hey, I’ve got an eye for fashion and style. The ex-wife had me do all the decorating and housework.”

“Boy howdy, you’d sure make a lady a good catch!”

“You only think that because you’ve only just met m- oh hey guys! Got the parts?”

While the other dumped cartloads of mechanical bits in a bay for Ellie, Sal made a bee-line for the commando.

“Whoa whoa buddy, I know what you’re thinking.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, and let me tell you, you’ve got nothing to worry about. Ellie isn’t really my type. Don’t get me wrong, I like a girl with extra, but she’s got a bit too much badonkadonk.”

At that Salvador shoved a finger all the way up at Axton’s face and gritted out, “There is. NO. Such thing. As ‘too much’ badonkadonk.”

“Sure, sure, buddy. Anyways, I did you a solid and talked you up while Zero and I were kicking around here. You should have fer-tile fields next time you hit her up, mmmmyep.”

While Sal looked much happier at that, he did have to frown and say, “Uh, Axton, I am not ready for kids right now…”

“What? No no, I just meant you’ll have a better chance and-”

“Hey! If you two dumbasses have the time to talk, you can do it while emptying the runners!”

“Ma’am. yes ma’am! Right away, ma’am!”

Axton’s salute was really something.

* * *

“Are you friggin’ kidding me? We can put a catapult on this thing that digistructs explosive barrels?”

“Yeah, is that not the stupidest thing you’ve ever heard?”

“What?! That is fucking awesome!”

“What? Gaige, you’re an engineer, can’t you see that just making it a rocket launcher would be a ton more efficient and-”

“And a ton _more boring_. Dude I am _so_ using this as artillery to shell the Bloodshot encampment.”

Axton blinked for a second. Then, “Huh. That’s… actually a pretty good idea.”

“SHOTGUN! Called it, can’t-”

“SHOTGUN! Called the other one! Ha-HA! Now we’ll see who the master of artillery is, the trained soldier or the amateur gamer girl. Judging from your inability to hit the broad side of a BATTLE CRUISER, I’m gonna guess me.”

“Yeah, we’ll see about that, dick for brains. Artillery is all equations, I am going to OWN you.”

* * *

Several days later, when the gate to the Bloodshot encampment hung loosely and ineffectually off a cliff several miles away, with Badmaw turned a half-hearted smear and the encampment itself was a blasted and smoking crater, the Vault Hunters decided that both Gaige and Axton won, if only for their enthusiastic pursuit of the prize and the eradication of every living thing in their target zone.

Which meant that because she came up with the idea, Gaige claimed the victory.

"Are you all almost done getting into the Dam? Roland can handle whatever the Bloodshots dish out, but I generally don't like letting him get tortured any longer than I have to."

That resulted in a few guilty looks.

* * *

"If you had told me a year, no, even three months ago that I would be assaulting a bandit base above what amounts to an enormous, constantly flushing toilet, I would have told you to lay off the crack."

"So, any plans for getting up this mess?"

The Vault Hunters were sitting at the base of a spiralling climb up a cylindrical room that was absolutely crawling with bandits. Their usual tactic of "enter in a cloud of bullets, slag and death" didn't look like it was going to work.

"Well, they've almost all got elevation on us, so even if there is a crapton of cover, it's not ideal. Also these guys look like they're at least halfways well armed."

"Yeaaahhh, we can blame Marcus for that," mentioned Gaige, holding up an Echo recording.

"Wonderful. So, our first problem is going to be getting on the ramp without getting riddled with hot lead and less comfortable bullets too. If I start barking orders, do you guys think you can follow them?"

A series of shrugs, nods and an uncertain, unbalanced hand from Salvador followed.

"Greeeaaat. So, here's the plan We are going to bolt as far as we can into that room before they notice and start shooting. Then we hit the deck, take cover, and return fire where we can. Next, we're going to leapfrog cover. That means going to the next nearest bit of cover that doesn't have one of us behind it. When I call someone's name, you head for the nearest piece. The rest of us suppress the bandits, which is a fancy military technical term for putting so much ammunition in their general direction they shit their pants and keep their heads down. Gaige, we're counting on you for that, since this doesn't require any aiming."

One hand gave Axton the finger, and the other gave him a thumbs up.

"That applies to everyone but Zero. Zeedude, when we all hit the floor, I want you out to do your stealth thing and book it as far up as you can make it and start dropping people from behind. Cool?"

":D"

"Right. Everybody ready? Oh, and uh, no screaming this time, k, guys?"

* * *

"WHO THE HELL USES A ROCKET LAUNCHER INDOORS?!"

"Well, in his defense, it is a pretty big room."

"Not helping Maya."

"Sorry, jeez." 

"Gaige, how's Zero looking?"

"Um... well, suddenly I'm a lot more qualified to deal with him, but the, uh, prognosis isn't... great."

"What? What the hell are you talking about over there?"

"Nothing! Uh, nothing. Just... gimme a few, ok?"

"Wonderful."

"Hey, Maya, can you do the Siren thingy again?"

"It's _called_ a phaselock."

"Yeah, that."

A sigh, "Yes, but you know his shi-"

"Great. Sal, when the big dumbass goes floaty again, I want you to completely fuck his day up, ok?"

"Can do, bossman."

"Right, lock 'im, Maya."

Maya and Axton popped out of cover long enough for Maya to do her business and for Axton to throw two items. The first was his turret, which went hurtling way past the lunatic bandit with the demolitions fetish. The second was a MIRV, loaded with slag juice. They both ducked back into cover while the one missile the bandit had managed to loose sailed over their heads and blew close enough to deafen them momentarily.

Have you ever tried to throw two things at once? Like, from different hands? Try it. It's not easy, is it? So Axton counted it a small miracle that the two chunks of metal didn't bounce off each other in mid air. And that the turret landed somewhere with line-of-sight to the bandit. The MIRV on the other hand, blew its load and most of its babies over the side and into the gigantic toilet, which the Vault Hunters HUDs now informed them was called Satan's Suckhole.

Maya was pretty sure that was also a metaphor.

While the bandit floated mid air and weathered the utterly ludicrous quantity of gyrojets coming from Salvador, Axton hopped out of cover and sprinted for him. Maya yelled after him, but quickly realized that if she couldn't hear, neither could he. Then a whole lot of things happened at once. The phaselock ended. The bandit dropped to the floor. The lone surviving MIRV mini-nade blew at the bandit's feet. Salvador ran out of ammunition. A hidden psycho reared up to take Axton's head off. Zero's sensors came back online. Axton's turret fell off the damn box it was perched precariously on.

Time slowed for the commando and he welcomed it. It was one of those moments where things were going to go so epically he was going to be riding an adrenaline high for the next hour, or he'd dead or as good as. He slipped onto his side and slid beneath the psycho's legs. He digistructed the Dog from his inventory. He watched the bandit try to wipe the slag off himself. He watched the rocket launcher not aim anywhere near him. He felt his slide come to an end right at the feet of the bandit. He read the bandit's nametag.

"Mad Mike."

And then he emptied the Dog, point blank into the fucker's shield and chest.

The torrent of bullets shattered the shield finally and made a bloody mess of the fatass's body, but the monster of a man was still standing. In a last, defiant gesture, he pointed the rocket launcher right at his feet, right at Axton. 

"I'm takin' you with me, grind-"

And then his head exploded.

When they finally rolled the carcass off Axton's body they came face to face with a very bloody, very disgusted man. Who was clutching a (relatively) pristine Tediore rocket launcher.

"This is my Bazooka. There are many like it, but this one is mine. And god help the mother fucker that gets in my way now."

A silence.

"So... what you're saying is... I cannot have?"

"No, Sal."

Then Maya punched him in the dick for being a glory-hogging jackass again.

* * *

“Oh my god, Gaige, would you get down from there?”

Maya was beginning to lose her patience with this team. They had a very simple, straightforward mission. Break this Roland character out of jail. But now, because they’d spotted some heavy-duty chest up in the piping of the jailblock, the idiots were pulling a balancing act to get up there.

Sal shouldered the weight on the bottom, a solid foundation block. Stood on his shoulders was Axton and sat on his was Zero, who for reasons unfathomable to her had leapt eagerly to this task. (Spoiler: the reason was guns) Perched on _his_ shoulders was Gaige, who was now scrambling at the piping, trying to get a grip to haul herself up.

“Hey, uh, guys, can we do this more quicker? I don’t want to say you’re heavy, but, uh, you’re pretty fucking heavy,” strained Salvador.

“Just a second, juuuust a second…” muttered Gaige as she reached for and clamped onto a pipe with her metal hand. Then she hauled herself off Zero’s shoulders and in unbalancing the human tower, caused it to topple to the surprise of utterly no one. Amidst the grumbling and growling of the men, and the irritated face-palming of the Siren the _chunk-hiss_ of a chest opening could be heard.

Then Gaige made it rain guns, tossing the loot over her shoulder and onto the ground. Most pieces never actually impacted, getting snapped up by the Hunters, though some indifferent specimens clattered lonesomely on the floor.

“Hey, there’s some kind of control room over here!”

“Oh for-! CAN WE PLEASE GET GOING ALREADY?!”

“Cool it Maya baby, just gimme a second. Think you’re gonna like this.” Gaige’s voice was taking on that hoarse low tone that usually preceded a particularly manic rampage. Then with a series of loud snaps, the jail cells began grinding open. The Siren blinked.

“Oh. Well. I guess that is kind of useful,” she said as Gaige leapt down from on high, a shit-eating grin on her face.

But it wasn’t before their progress was once again halted, this time by the appearance of a fucking huge Dahl crate, filled with guns.

“Who locks up a gun chest? Who locks up a gun chest, IN A JAIL CELL?!” Maya’s eye began to twitch in the manner of those pushed just a touch too far.

“You are thinking too much, chica. Here, have a splatgun.”

“What the hell is a splatgun?!”

Salvador grinned, showing every one of his too-white teeth as he handed the Siren what looked to be a shotgun with canisters of… glowy… green… stuff attached to it.

“Hyperion over-complicated bullshit.”

“This is made by bandits.”

“Bandit-copied Hyperion over-complicated bullshit.”

“Oooh, is that an E-tech weapon? Zed was telling me about them…”

“Yah. Why not take a shot, eh, chica?” The shortest among them gestured to the long hallway they’d come down.and waggled his eyebrows. Maya eyed the man suspiciously, but pumped the shotgun and fired from the shoulder. With an utterly disgusting horking sound, the bandit piece of crap vomited forth a ball of acidic goop that hurtled across the room and splattered against the far wall. The look of disgust on Maya’s face slowly faded as the ball kept bouncing, melting its way through absolutely everything short of the walls.

“...yeah, ok, this is pretty awesome.” she said, as Sal slapped her on the back. “But now can we get back to rescuing Roland?”

“Sure thing. Hey, there’s this cell at the far end that didn’t open. Doesn’t look to be hooked up to the main breakers, what say we take a look?” Axton jerked his thumb over his shoulder to indicate the direction.

* * *

Below the massive, spike-wrought emblem of the Bloodshot eye lay a single cell. Inside that single cell lay a single cot and upon that single cot lay a now-single man. He did not look at all concerned by his predicament, arms behind his head, legs crossed casually. At their approach, he swung himself off the cot easily.

“Vault hunters!” he said in a warm voice, “Good to finally meet y’all.”

“Hey, so you’re the Roland dude we’re supposed to be rescuing? Wicked. Sal? Blast the the lock.”

But before the near-midget could put Jakobs Iron to iron lock, there was a low whine, and the rear wall of Roland’s cell blew in, revealing the irritating yellow scheme of a Hyperion loader. Roland didn’t even flinch as rocks pelted past him, into the bars of the cell.

“This’ll just take a second,” he said calmly and then proceeded to tackle the loader into the ground. Ripping off a panel, he gouged out its power core, spun to his feet and whipped the exploding device into another robot, detonating it. As the Vault Hunters looked on wide-eyed, a miniature bulldozer crashed through the wreckage and into him, slamming him up against the cell doors. He groaned and rolled pathetically

Maya moved to haul him to his feet, the loader unfolded from its bulldozer form and prepared to execute the raider. It was not to be, however, as Roland suddenly jerked into a sitting position, holding a loader’s arm with a gun still attached. The mag emptied into the Bullloader, which stood there for a second and then toppled over.

Silence greeted the leader of the Crimson Raiders before he straightened. Then Axton spoke for all them.

“Ok, that? That was badass. I am suddenly a lot more confident in this whole “kill Jack business.”

“Heh, thanks. Well, that’s that. Now, let's see about getting out of here.”

Then fields of blue force snapped around his limbs as a massive conical Hyperion robot touched down on the other side of the wall behind him. 

“God fucking dammit,” muttered Maya, leveling her SMG.

“Vault Hunters, you gotta stop this thing!” yelled Roland as he was prised from his grip on the jail bars.

“And that’s how Handsome Jack pays ransoms! Long time no see, Roland.”

“God FUCKING dammit!” yelled Axton. As an Exploader careened into the cell, he yelled, “Everyone back!”

The detonation knocked them all sprawling on their asses or fronts, depending on which direction they were facing. When the smoke and ringing in their heads cleared, it became clear that Handsome Jack had launched a full-scale lunar invasion of the Bloodshot Dam to wipe it clean of the bandit threat. The bandits were fighting back, but if they weren’t a match for five jumped-up lunatics with guns, they weren’t going to be a match for hundreds upon hundreds of clanking, soulless murder machines.

“I hate that smug son-of-a-bitch,” growled Maya as she clambered to her feet. She digistructed her brand new splatgun and stalked towards the hole in the wall, mechanical murder on her mind.

“Hey, ah, Maya, don’t you think we kinda need a gameplan for thi-”

The Siren whirled on Axton, eyes lit blue in intensity. The commando flinched instinctively from the glare.

“I have a gameplan. It is kill everything between us and that fucking blue robot. No stopping, no mercy, and absolutely no dicking around.”

Then she caught up an Exploader that was about to interrupt in a phaselock and spiked it into a burly bandit, ending them both in an explosion of gore and fire. 

“Questions?” she asked, icily.

Axton blinked and swallowed. “No, ma’am.”

* * *

“-Please, tell me he didn’t send Wilhel-”

“Oh my god shut up, you useless whining artificial construct. We are in the middle of a goddamn warzone and we really don’t need your nattering foreshadowing.”

“Hey! Be nice to the AI!”

“Shut up, Gaige.”

“What is a Wilhelm?” Sal asked to the empty air.

* * *

They walked into a section of the dam where loaders were dismembering, mutilating and crushing bandits in between bouts of filling them with bullets. As bloody gouted out of one bandit, another broke free of a loader’s grasp and sprinted for cover. Unfortunately, at that point cover was occupied with Maya and she punched her fist straight through his skull. Then, with the sound of a choir all simultaneously projectile vomiting, she opened up with the splatgun.

The square promptly filled with dozens of globes of bouncing acid, which ate away at armour, skin and sundry crates and armour. It got through barrels which promptly exploded catastrophically, setting of chain reactions and reducing the area to sparking, flaming sizzling rubble. Anything that wasn't chemical stopped moving of its own volition.

Sal followed the smoke through the air, and caught sight of a massive statue.

“Hey, check it out. A massive statue of Marcus.”

“Yeah, wow, how the hell did we miss that?” asked Gaige.

“What part of ‘no dicking around’ did you not understand?” growled Maya, stalking through the ruin she’d inflicted.

* * *

“Look out, badass loa-” called Roland over ECHO, before Maya caught it in a phaselock and the Vault Hunters filled it with lead and acid.

“-der. Holy crap.”

“Is it just me,” muttered Axton under his breath to the others as Maya ripped the arm off a legless, crawling loader and used it to beat the life out of a cowering bandit, “or is this warpath legitimately terrifying?”

“I cannot feel fear. If I could, I’d be running-”

Zero’s delivery was interrupted by Maya screaming at a group of retreating bandits, “YOU SHOULD _ALL_ BE RUNNING!” as she emptied an SMG into their fleeing backs.

The group took a moment to appreciate the karmic alignment that allowed that coincidence to occur.

“Girl needs to get laid.”

They all stared at Gaige. “What? Probably true. She was raised by monks, ffs.”

* * *

“Kill this constructor so we can get the hell outta here!”

Roland’s order was rather unnecessary as the group of Vault Hunters came tearing around the corner, as their every gun trained on the lumbering thing. In a blaze of gunfire they tore through its shields, only for the floating surveyors to repair them. They traced their fire to the floating irritants only to have one spin around and present an orange field to them.

Their fusillade hit the shield and rebounding upon them. Maya and Salvador hit the floor, taken through the leg by ricochets of her own bullets. 

“Goddammit!” the Siren swore as the Constructor digistructed brand new loaders all around them. “We need to get through that shield!”

“It’s a reflector, not a shield,” started Axton, “It’ll come down to explo-”

“On i!” crowed Gaige, leaping on top of an overturned car, wielding the largest rocket launcher any of them had ever seen. Glistening white steel was decorated with the garish chequer-marks of Torgue and it belched fire and smoke as it launched its warhead. “Fire in the hole!”

“You yell that _before_ firing, nitwit!” yelled Axton, ducking behind the same car. The colossal explosion took out all of the surveyors and the damn constructor’s shields besides. It washed over the car, a blazing hot wave of concussive force that blew over Gaige, setting hair hair and skirt fluttering in the wind and lighting the manic grin on her face.

Zero sliced through the loaders around Maya and Salvador, helping the shorter man to his feet while Maya lurched to hers, slamming her fist into a robotic torso and hauling herself upright.

The constructor died in fire.

Roland hit the ground rolling, coming up ready. “Lunar reinforcements inbound!”

Axton tossed the soldier a spare rifle and got a quick, professional nod in return. The Vault Hunters made their stand behind a wall of wrecked cars as the Hyperion moonbase bombarded them with a small army of loaders. The robots, meanwhile, were met by a veritable wall of bullets and energy. If you thought a fight with one turret was unfair, two was simply overkill. Axton’s dispensed death, while Roland’s dispensed health and ammunition. The group could probably have held out indefinitely, but at some point a pencil-pusher somewhere in Hyperion decided that losing millions of dollars of equipment to thousands of cheapass bullets was a losing idea. The final loader met its end when Axton just let go of his empty Tediore rocket launcher and gave a comical shrug.

The onslaught halted as quickly as it had begun, and the Vault Hunters stood alone in adrenaline-filled stillness, the only sound the occasional crackle of fire or sparking of electricity. Then Roland turned to them.

"Thanks. I'd be dead if it weren't for you all." He paused to wipe blood from his mouth, the result of a grenade that had exploded too close for comfort. "Meet me back at Sanctuary. I've got a plan to stop Jack, but it won't work without you."

And he left them to their looting, limping towards the Fast Travel station. 

"You saved Roland! This planet's been waiting for a hero like you. Thank goodness Jack didn’t send Wilhelm."

"What the fuck is a Wilhelm?!" yelled Sal at the empty air.

* * *

“So… about them… insides of yours.”

“?”

“Uh, just wanted to let you know that I, uh, won’t tell the others…”

“...”

“Look, I’m all for sentient rights and self-determination and all that, so if you don’t want to tell them, I’m not gonna, is all I’m saying, k?”

“:)”

“Cool.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was so glad no one actually called it a Dam Fine Rescue in game. Though I can totally see Lilith going for it, and then going "Eh? Eh? Oh come on, that was a good one!"


End file.
